Fans must become investors

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Taking football public can be a strategic step to modernize football, expand governance and intensify economic relations between supporters and clubs. Around the world, several clubs have shares on the stock market, some with a float (share which is not in the hands of the controllers) greater than 60%, such as Borussia Dortmund or Celtic. Colo-Colo and the Universidad Católica in Chile have Brazilian investors. Benfica, after record results, reached its highest price this year.

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In the 17th century, Portugal dominated maritime trade until the Netherlands created the East India Company, the first company to issue public shares. By allowing thousands of citizens to become shareholders, the Netherlands democratized investment, expanded the scale of operations, surpassed the Portuguese model based on closed capital and laid the foundations of the modern financial market.

Brazilian clubs are going through a similar period. They need capital, face growing debt, and are looking for new sources of revenue to compete globally. Opening up to the capital market can enable the exchange of expensive debt, finance infrastructure, professionalize management and bring fans closer to the financial decisions of institutions.

The history of the clubs itself reinforces this logic. Most were born as associations supported by their members, with quotas, tickets and an intense associative life. Over the past decade, the country has seen an explosion in fan numbers. They have grown from around 150,000 to more than 2 million, becoming significant sources of income.

The capital market is expanding this vocation, particularly alongside the growth of sports betting, which reveals fans increasingly willing to bet on football. Buying shares, in this context, means betting on management, transparency and the future. The study shows that 40% of those interested would invest to strengthen their team and 60% would seek return or diversification, even going so far as to buy shares in well-run rival clubs.

For this to become a reality, financial accountability, transparency, spending limits and business models capable of generating liquidity are essential – aspects which tend to be encouraged by the financial fair play system that the CBF is starting to implement. There are also concrete signs of popular investment potential. The conversion of assets into digital tokens (tokenization) of credit rights linked to the FIFA solidarity mechanism, carried out by Vasco and Santos, and initiatives such as the Corinthians fundraiser, which raised more than 40 million reais, show that fans want to participate, not just consume.

Brazil can reinvent football by transforming passion into assets, creating modern, safe and accessible mechanisms for fans to invest in clubs, protecting them from adventurers and predatory investors.

No other country benefits from such favorable conditions: one of the world’s largest economies, clubs with the biggest supporters in the world and a sport that is a national priority. If clubs, regulators and fans understand this path, the country could enter the era of fan-investors, with football leading the maturation of Brazil’s capital market and ushering in a new cycle of development for the sport.